March 21, 2012

Obama's Self-Regard

Why Obama makes Muhammad Ali seem modest....

President Obama applied "Flat Earth Society" imagery to GOP Presidential candidates, whilst comparing himself to Christopher Columbus, no less. This comes on top of his comparing GOP critics to President Rutherford B. Hayes who, "O" claimed, during his term (1877-1881) questioned the need for the first telephone installation at the White House, saying he could not see any reason to have one; except that there is no evidence Hayes actually said this.

But obviously Rutherford B. Hayes isn’t as “forward-looking” as a 21st-century president who believes in Jimmy Carter malaise, 1970s Eurostatist industrial policy, 1940s British health-care reforms, 1930s New Deal–sized entitlements premised on mid-20th-century birth rates and life expectancy, and all paid for by a budget with more zeroes than anybody’s seen since the Weimar Republic. If that’s not a shoo-in for Mount Rushmore, I don’t know what is.

I was interested in the rest of Obama’s yukfest of history’s biggest idiots. Considering that he is (in the words of historian Michael Beschloss) “the smartest guy ever to become president,” the entire passage sounded as if it was plucked straight from one of those “Top Twenty Useful Quotes for Forward-Looking Inspirational Speakers” websites. And whaddayaknow? Rutherford B. Hayes, the TV flash in the pan, the horse is here to stay — they’re all at the Wikiquote page on “Incorrect Predictions.” Fancy that! You can also find his selected examples at the web page “Some Really Really Bad Predictions About the Future” and a bazillion others.

Steyn goes on to detail just how far off the mark "O" was with his bogus historical citations. He likens Obama to the Gershwin lyric for "They All Laughed"--at, among other things, Christopher Columbus for saying the world was round.

But here I part company with Steyn. A more apt American Songbook citation would be from Cole Porter. Imagine The One standing before a mirror--something he probably does at least as often as John Edwards--and singing to his own image:

Before his death, Osama bin Laden boldly commanded his network to organize special cells in Afghanistan and Pakistan to attack the aircraft of President Obama and Gen. David H. Petraeus.

“The reason for concentrating on them,” the al-Qaeda leader explained to his top lieutenant, “is that Obama is the head of infidelity and killing him automatically will make [Vice President] Biden take over the presidency. . . . Biden is totally unprepared for that post, which will lead the U.S. into a crisis. As for Petraeus, he is the man of the hour . . . and killing him would alter the war’s path” in Afghanistan.

Ignatius did not mean to prove my point, but he did. Obama sees himself as a world transformational figure with a unique ability to connect with the Islamic world, due to his paternal roots and his childhood exposure to Islam. In fact, because Obama was born to a Muslim father, he is not only an unbeliever, as with his 43 predecessors; "O" is an apostate, and thus guilty of a capital offense in the eyes of Islamists like OBL.

Bottom Line. Obama's monumental self-regard is eminently justified for Mainstream Media liberals. With rare exceptions they continue to regard Obama with the same awe with which he regards himself. Whether voters share this view will figure prominently in the outcome of the November election.